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Module 2, Section 1.3 Exercise - Exploring the InternetQUESTION: 'Take another look at some of these sites and explore them in more depth. Select one site which matches your view of 'what the Internet is' and one which surprised you or challenged your assumptions. Make notes under the headings shown (summary, reactions, reliability, bias, perspective, how might the site affect the non-Internet way of doing the same thing) below for both of the sitesSite One - World NewsA site that matched my expectations was World News. This brings together news and current affairs stories from all across the globe into one convenient site which has the capability of presenting the information in 19 different world languages. The format and content of the site is as I expected, with headlines presented with photos and a selection of links to different individual countries and various news subtopics such as economics and sport. It is like a newspaper in style with many short articles and it is interesting that they are not from one central source but drawn in from a variety of well-respected news institutions such as the Financial Times, Reuters, BBC News, Hindustan Times and ABC news. I feel that the site should be reliable because of its representation of news from many varied sources - the reader is more likely to receive a balanced viewpoint on breaking stories by reading material derived from several sources. The information is very up to date and there are many related links to other sources of extended information on each story. I had a sneaking suspicion that this site would be American although from examining the 'about us' section as well as the feedback and job vacancies page I could not find a postal address to confirm this. All references to the company's overall location refer to 'worldwide'. Having an online world news site may or may not affect the 'non-Internet way of doing the same thing' in that people might watch less television, read less newspapers or listen to the radio less, although I think that most people, if they have sufficient interest in current affairs, would still want to see the television pictures to get a deeper understanding, or read a newspaper article to get a particular journalist's opinion and background information. I think that World News is an excellent compliment to existing mediums of news presentation but I think for most people it wouldn't fully replace the conventional methods of keeping up to date with world affairs. Site Two - Distributed.netA site that challenged my assumptions was Distributed.net. I had heard about the idea of linking computers worldwide to act as a gigantic and virtual supercomputer but had not previously experienced this first hand. Current projects being cracked by the worldwide network revolve around 72 bit variations of encryption algorithms and the Optimal Golomb Ruler (OGR), with future projects planned to examine Fermat numbers and elliptic curve cryptosystems. In 2000 Distributed.net joined forces with United Devices who, amongst other things, run distributed network research projects into cures for smallpox and cancer. These sites seem reliable, unbiased and totally open to new members all working towards the same end - to increase knowledge, further research and to develop a particular science, be it mathematics or medicine. Since researching them I have personally downloaded the distributed network client and am currently running the United Devices Cancer Research Project which screens complex molecules and proteins whilst I'm not using my computer. As for whether using distributed networks will affect how research is carried out in future? I can see it making a huge impact and at the same a small impact. Scientists will still be needed in labs, someone still has to provide the raw data for analysis and experts will still be crucial to furthering their sciences, however, with the assistance of the distributed networks the speed of scientific development and processing of information can be vastly increased meaning that important breakthroughs may be closer than previously expected Last updated on Wednesday, 14-Apr-2004 07:53:06 BST
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